It is well known that the administration of steroids such as estrogens and progestins hormone replacement therapy, aids in the reduction of cyclic hot flashes and other post-menopausal symptoms.
The transdermal route of parenteral delivery of drugs provides many advantages over other administrative routes and transdermal systems for delivering a wide variety of drugs or other beneficial agents are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,598,122; 3,598,123; 4,379,454; 4,286,592; 4,314,557 and 4,568,343, for example, all of which are incorporated herein by reference.
However, despite the development of the art, there has remained a continuing need for improved techniques of providing female users of said medications with basal blood levels of estrogens and progestins.
The present invention delivers therapeutically effective rates of select steroids and offers the advantages of: greatly increased drug bioavailability compared to oral or intramuscularly administered drugs, convenient termination of therapy and improved compliance.
Both estrogen (provided by an estradiol ester) and progesterone are needed to alleviate post-menopausal symptoms: the former to reduce cyclic hot flashes and most other common symptoms and the latter to reduce breakthrough bleeding and minimize endometrial hyperplasia. This invention provides for delivering an estradiol ester and progesterone by means of separate transdermal applications or combined together in a single delivery system.